Providence schools show improvement in graduation rate; fewer students dropping out

Wednesday

Feb 12, 2014 at 9:01 AM

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Both the graduation rate and the dropout rate have improved in the Providence schools, school officials said Wednesday morning.

Linda Borg Journal Staff Writer @lborgprojocom

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Both the graduation rate and the dropout rate have improved in the Providence schools, school officials said Wednesday morning.

Graduation rates have increased from 65.2 percent in 2012 to 71.4 percent this past year and the dropout rate is down from 20.5 percent to 12 percent over a three-year period.

To date, 620 students are in danger for not graduating this year, based on the latest NECAP scores, which were released last month, school officials said.

“While we still have work to do, the Providence community should rightfully be proud of our nearly 6 percentage points increase in the four-year graduation rate and our 5 percentage-point decrease in dropout,” said Supt. Susan Lusi.

During the 2012-2013 school year, 65 percent of eleventh graders did not score high enough on the math NECAP tests to earn a diploma. Twenty percent did not reach that bar in reading.

Those students had the opportunity to retake the NECAP in October. A total of 883 needed to do so.